Syeda Mazhar
Another episode of moral blindness that took place in Kashmir – the land of the cursed, where the Indian Army forces deployed in Kashmir now routinely use pellet guns to stymie roadside demonstrations. Since the death of the young Kashmiri popular leader, Burhan Muzaffar Wani, the Indian Army have shot dead atleast 45 people of the thousands that came out on the streets to protest and mourn his demise. Moreover, some 3,140 people have been injured and hundreds of civilians blinded by pellet cartridges that fire 500 tiny metal balls per round.
Despite the a strict curfew imposed by the government in Srinagar, close to 300,000 people attended Burhan’s funeral prayers. Supporters poured in every form to attend his funeral. Fifty back to back funeral prayers of the slain were offered.
The vicious cycle of curfew, strikes, nocturnal raids and indiscriminate use of force in India-held Kashmir continues unabated for the fourth week. The police there aided by the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and Indian army has used live ammunition to break up protests. The use of ‘non-lethal’ pellet guns to control crowds has proven especially disastrous. Scores of young men have lost their eyesight and hundreds others have sustained serious injuries due to the ‘pellet terror’.
In the latest tensions, the youngest victim was a four-year-old girl. Nine-year-old Tamana Ashraf of Ganderbal district is another victim being treated at the Srinagar hospital.She was sitting at the window in her house when pellets whizzed by, hitting her left eye, her mother Shamima
“I saw a small iron ball in her eye. When we tried to hospitalise her, police stopped us and beat us up. I was crying to see what they had done to my daughter. Luckily we managed to reach here,” she said.
Fearing profiling and reprisals of injured youths by police, hospital officials have assigned serial numbers to pellet gun victims to hide their identity. This development came after it emerged that undercover police officers have been roaming in hospitals hunting for injured protesters.
The aim to inflict maximum physical and psychological damage on protesters, by effectively blinding them, has led many to directly question the ethics and moral blindness of India’s policies in Kashmir.
Kashmiris have answered India’s aggression by observing a general strike for more than three weeks now. The picketing, even if purely symbolic (resulting in an estimated loss of more than Rs1billion daily to Kashmir’s economy) has been fashioned to challenge the government’s writ.
Steered by the united Hurriyat Conference, businesses have kept their shutters down, workers have stayed home and schools and offices have remained closed.
Each evening, for the last 23 days, mosques, spread across the length and breadth of the valley reverberate with songs and anthems of Kashmir’s freedom. Slogans extolling the right to self-determination are commonplace. Graffiti written in praise of militants has come up in several places. The fury is reminiscent of the early 1990s when armed insurgency first started in the disputed valley. However, the new generation of Kashmiris in the foreground is both defiant and daring. The impetuosity is newfound.
Condemnation over India’s high-handedness has been swift. Expressing regret over the loss of lives and injuries in the clashes, UN chief Ban Ki-moon called on parties to exercise “maximum restraint” to avoid further violence in Kashmir. Even as major global powers like the US and China joined in to express concern over the growing unrest in the valley, Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi – a quixotic right-wing politician who usually revels in communicating through social media – has maintained a steady silence over the issue.
It is this ability of India to deny responsibility for its damnable actions in the valley – also called plausible deniability – that has increased acrimony in Kashmir. The Burhan episode has simply given an aperture, a vent to the aspirations of millions.
The prevailing circumstances in the Indian administered Kashmir following the mayhem of July 8th has put a hold on the everyday life of the people. Weddings, graduations, school exams, hospital visits, funerals and even births can be cut short due to unexpected outbreaks of violence. The temperature has long simmered, with periodic triggers making the militarized zone boil over.
Kashmir’s geostrategic importance to all sides is that it serves as a natural buffer zone, one that the Indian government has called its atoot ang – an “un-severable limb.”
Amidst well-substantiated narratives of torture, rape and the overall subjugation of their communities by the Indian armed forces, Kashmiris view the military as a tourniquet ever tightening around their throats, squelching their voices, especially in circumstances of political dissent.
This is the status quo in the Kashmir Valley, where 60 percent of the population is below 30 years of age. However, based on how current events in Kashmir are being discussed in a majority of Indian media, policy circles and amongst ordinary citizens, it appears that most Indians find this reality hard to imagine. The average Indian is no longer cognizant of how the state has dehumanized an entire population by consistently discussing Kashmir through a security prism, and only during “security crises” and “border infiltrations.” This has caused a slow and systematic “social death” – a method that has been effectively employed by governments through the segregation and exclusion of communities to the point that they become less than human in the wider public eye. Alienating Kashmir, imposing media bans, debarring the Human Right Organizations from the region and justifying their actions in the International forum, the Indian Army, succeeds in keeping the world’s eye at bay. These are the same policies that were applied during slavery and apartheid regimes and dictatorships.
